Flannery O'Conner and the use of grotesque character in "Good country people" and "a good man is hard to find"
"The representation of the grotesque is a characteristic of much 20th century writing" (Holman 61). Almost all of O 'Connor 's short stories usually end in horrendous, freak fatalities or, at the very least, a character 's emotional devastation. People have categorized O 'Connor 's work as "Southern Gothic" (Walters 30). In Many of her short stories, A Good Man Is Hard To Find for example, Flannery O 'Connor creates grotesque characters to illustrate the evil in people.
Written in 1953, A Good Man Is Hard To Find is one of O ' Connor 's most known pieces of work and has received many awards. Throughout the story, you come across many twists and turns when you least expect it. A Good Man Is Hard To Find is a story which includes religion, right and wrong and society as a whole. O ' Connor writes this particular short - story from a 3rd person narrative and also from the perspective of the grandmother, who is one of the main characters ("A Good.." Online). The grandmother, along with her son, Bailey, daughter in law and two grandchildren, were going on vacation together. The grandmother had read about "The Misfit" who had been going on a killing spree down near Florida so naturally she did not want to go.
"The instant the valise moved, the newspaper top she had over the basket under it rose with a snarl and Pitty Sing, the cat, sprang onto Bailey 's shoulders. The children were thrown to the floor and their mother, clutching the baby, was thrown out the door onto the ground: the old lady was thrown into the front seat."(O 'Connor 124).
That quote from the story is just one example of how O 'Connor may twist a story when u least expect it. After the accident, a young, helpful man and his two friends came along to help them. Little did they know, this courteous young man was none other than, "The Misfit". The misfit was a confused person who felt no remorse about killing. He was a very complicated man. "She would have been a good women." the misfit said, "If there
Written in 1953, A Good Man Is Hard To Find is one of O ' Connor 's most known pieces of work and has received many awards. Throughout the story, you come across many twists and turns when you least expect it. A Good Man Is Hard To Find is a story which includes religion, right and wrong and society as a whole. O ' Connor writes this particular short - story from a 3rd person narrative and also from the perspective of the grandmother, who is one of the main characters ("A Good.." Online). The grandmother, along with her son, Bailey, daughter in law and two grandchildren, were going on vacation together. The grandmother had read about "The Misfit" who had been going on a killing spree down near Florida so naturally she did not want to go.
"The instant the valise moved, the newspaper top she had over the basket under it rose with a snarl and Pitty Sing, the cat, sprang onto Bailey 's shoulders. The children were thrown to the floor and their mother, clutching the baby, was thrown out the door onto the ground: the old lady was thrown into the front seat."(O 'Connor 124).
That quote from the story is just one example of how O 'Connor may twist a story when u least expect it. After the accident, a young, helpful man and his two friends came along to help them. Little did they know, this courteous young man was none other than, "The Misfit". The misfit was a confused person who felt no remorse about killing. He was a very complicated man. "She would have been a good women." the misfit said, "If there
Cited: Asals, Frederick, "Flannery O 'Connor: The Imagination of Extremity. 1982. University of Georgia Press. Rpt. In Frederick Asals "The Double". Modern Critical Views Flannery O 'Connor. 93-109. O 'Connor, Flannery. "O 'Connor 's Place in the Literary Tradition of the South." Readings on Flannery O 'Connor. C.Hugh Holman. San Diego: Green haven Press. Inc, 2001. 58-66. O 'Connor, Flannery. "Good Country People" The Complete Stories of Flannery O 'Connor. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1971. 292-310. Walters, Dorothy. Flannery O 'Connor. Twayne 's United States Authors Series. Twayne Publishers, Inc: Boston, 1973. http://www.cyberpat.com/essays/flan.html The Dark Side of the Cross: Flannery O 'Connor 's Short Fiction ©1996 Patrick Galloway . http://faculty.kutztown.edu/reagan/oconnor.html. Dr. Bette A. Reagan http://www.mediaspecialist.org/cooklight.html Light and Shadow: Religious Grace in Two Stories by Flannery O 'Connor © 2002, David Allen Cook. http://mnmn.essortment.com/flanneryoconno_rqkk.htm A Good Man Is Hard To Find.